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August242013

01:59

“If you can find within yourself the slightest shred of true uncertainty, then guard it like a forester nursing a campfire. If you can make it blaze up into a flame of curiosity, it will make you light and eager, and give purpose to your questioning and direction to your skills.”

September112011

18:59

“If you sent me to an alternate universe where politicians were honest, bureaucrats cared, and voters weren’t so irrational—a world where good-idea policy initiatives tended to actually accomplish their stated goals without unexpected negative side effects—a world where the clear and visible end result of getting governments to do more and more was that economies grew faster and faster and people became happier and happier—then, in that world, I wouldn’t be a libertarian.”

January222011

23:38

“Procrastination by reading random articles does not cause you to rest: You do not regain mental energy from it. Success and happiness cause you to regain willpower; what you need to heal your mind from any damage sustained by working is not inactivity, but reliably solvable problems which reliably deliver experienced jolts of positive reinforcement.”

February202009

Statistical fallacy: The sample of people applying to your job/sending manuscripts to your publisher/applying to your educational program/applying for your grant/wanting to date you is likely biased towards the incompetent – because they apply at many more places, as well as more frequently.

November262008

21:57

“I think [it is] a sensible coping strategy for
transhumanist atheists to donate to an anti-deathcharity after a
loved one dies. Death hurt us, so we will unmake Death. Let that be
the outlet for our anger, which is terrible and just.”

September302008

12:26

“One of the failure modes I've come to better understand in myself
since observing it in others, is what I call, "living in the
should-universe". The universe where everything works the way it
common-sensically ought to, as opposed to the actual is-universe we
live in. There's more than one way to live in the should-universe, and
outright delusional optimism is only the least subtle.”

“What is it that makes an executive? ... If I had to take a guess, I would call it "functioning without recourse" – living without any level above you to take over if you falter, or even to tell you if you're getting it wrong. To just get it done, even if the problem requires you to do something unusual, without anyone being there to look over your work and pencil in a few corrections.”

August282008

00:34

“I can't stand people who try to pass off their ideas as ancient wisdom. As if that were a recommendation! The fifth-century Chinese philosopher Xiaoguang Li observed that ancient civilizations are revered, and yet ancient civilizations are not wise like venerable human elders are wise. A civilization further back in time is younger, not older. The current civilization is always the senior, because the present enjoys a longer history than the past.

Incidentally, does it change your opinion if I tell you that Xiaoguang "Mike" Li is actually a friend of mine who lives in the Bay Area?”

“Once you draw a boundary around a group, the mind starts trying to harvest similarities from the group. And unfortunately the human pattern-detectors seem to operate in such overdrive that we see patterns whether they're there or not; a weakly negative correlation can be mistaken for a strong positive one with a bit of selective memory.”

August052008

02:13

“Politics was a feature of the ancestral
environment. We are descended from those who argued most persuasively
that the tribe's interest — not just their own interest —
required that their hated rival Uglak be executed.We certainly aren't
descended from Uglak, who failed to argue that his tribe's moral code —
not just his own obvious self-interest — required his survival.”

August032008

21:06

“[When estimating how long a project will take,] deliberately avoid thinking about the special, unique features of this project, and just ask how long it took to finish broadly
similar projects in the past. ... Better yet, ask an experienced outsider how long similar projects have taken.

You'll
get back an answer that sounds hideously long, and clearly reflects no
understanding of the special reasons why this particular task will take
less time. This answer is true. Deal with it.”